True, but some of us are willing to accept that the universe doesn't give a fuck about ideology.

When AGW first became a big issue in the 1990s I was talking against it as a big scam on Usenet; particularity my old haunt talk.origins. it was when one of the regulars, a biologist (why any scientist would waste his time debating Creationists I'll never understand), pointed out to me that the theory was reasonably well supported, there were a boatload of papers and that science isn't the product of emotional need, and I finally accepted that AGW, even if it suggested things that I didn't like, was legitimate science.

That's what GW needs to be all about, legitimate science and letting the science speak for itself. Unfortunately the likes of Al Gore have been a real problem for obtaining wide acceptance of GW. Let's please drop the hype and posturing on both sides and follow the science. This isn't about what someone would like to believe or wants to believe. It's about finding and accepting the scientific truth, and then doing what's necessary (and not doing what's not necessary). And please don't imply anything from th

Origin of Species was a great work for it's time, but it's probably not worth spending much time on it as it's so outdated. It works at the wrong abstraction. Natural selection works at the level of genes, not species.

This is poor advice at two levels. First, natural selection does work at the level of species too. Else there wouldn't be identifiable species or the possibility of species going extinct. Darwin wouldn't have gotten far with the theory of evolution, if it weren't for the huge variety of observable species.

Nor should one read Darwin just for the science, but rather to see how a master writer and scientist puts together a beautiful and profound scientific argument. So much of scientific writing today is crap. It's poorly written and stuffed with cliche, sometimes not even understood by the author much less anyone else who reads it.

It was when I started digging into the science that I started changing my mind. I found irresponsible handling of data, bizarre secrecy where there shouldn't be any, and so on. And all this has mushroomed in recent years.

Where by "digging" you mean reading and believing what it said on "Watt's Up With That", because the politics were more in alignment with yours than Al Gore's were.

Pretty much everything in your post is wrong. The IPCC's latest report does NOT state that the science supporting global climate change is "weaker than ever". Sure, a few minor botches were discovered in the report, but that doesn't change the fact that there is overwhelming evidence, supported by over 90% of climate scientists, that global climate change is real and caused by human actions.

Exxon Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson said on Wednesday that efforts to address climate change should focus on engineering methods to adapt to shifting weather patterns and rising sea levels rather than trying to eliminate use of fossil fuels.

Tillerson said humans have long adapted to change, and governments should

It was when I started digging into the science that I started changing my mind. I found irresponsible handling of data, bizarre secrecy where there shouldn't be any, and so on. And all this has mushroomed in recent years.

So you haven't actually starting digging into science (you know, the underlying physics and chemistry, climate models etc). Instead, you started digging into the scandals associated with that science, under the assumption that if you find sufficiently many, that would disprove the theory.

I was first introduced to the issue by Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth", and pretty much accepted what he was saying... except that there was some nagging doubt due to things like unlabeled graphs and the like in his presentation.

Those nagging doubts? They're the manifestation of your political identity conflicting with the science.

It was when I started digging into the science that I started changing my mind. I found irresponsible handling of data, bizarre secrecy where there shouldn't be any, and so on. And all this has mushroomed in recent years.

And this is how you rationalize your refusal to accept the science. You use selective thinking [skepdic.com] to focus on minor issues while ignoring what should be the glaring obvious parts.

Case in point: the recent admission by NCDC that certain USHCN data had been derived and used improperly, and they had known it for a long time. They said they had "intended to fix it" at some undefined point in the future, but the question is: why was it not fixed already, and why had they not told anyone (including scientists) about it, even though they knew about it?

Are you referring to this [politifact.com]? It seems like a rather minor bug.

And how about the recent "97%" claim by the people at SkepticalScience? It was dirt simple to show that it was nothing but statistical bullshit. Why would an organization representing responsible scientists lie to people?

Except that it hasn't been shown to be "nothing but statistical bullshit". I have yet to see a credible refutation of their claim that 97% of the published scientific a

Your experience comes about because it's very boring having to debunk the same old denialist myths hundreds of times over many years. You may find it fun to repeat yourself on things you've already been proved wrong on, but it's not that entertaining for the other side.

That's a very valid point, and where I don't recognise the username I do often go over the same ground. But I've been here long enough to recognise the regular faces, and there's a small core group of the same denialists commenting on every climate story. And they HAVE been personally proved wrong on these myths time and time again, and they continue to come back and repeat the myths again, as if the MiB had wiped their memories each time.

Hats off to you! Holy shit, you managed to do the impossible. Folks, get out your checkbooks! I won't get into the middle of the AGW debate itself, but rather your huge gaping logical error:

The truth is, this effect is almost surely completely unpredictable, and quite likely insignificant.

First, you state that the effects are "almost surely completely unpredictable". Then you make a prediction, drawing the conclusion that the effects are "quite likely insignificant". For fucks sake, if you don't have a model with good predictive power, you certainly can't draw any "quite likely" conclusions. Your proper response should have been that "the effects are unknown" if no model exists with good predictive power.

this is why people don't believe in AGW. Because every time that a proponent of it comes into contact with something that disagrees with their tidy view of the world, the first thing they do is lash out. And in the minds of a rational person, this simply screams "scam."

You don't believe in AGW because someone on slashdot was impolite in a comment? Which proves the whole thing is a scam to any "rational" person?

Try this. People who think the world is flat are fuckfaces. Does that imply that the round-earth

Can we agree that our carbon emissions are ~200% as large as the rise in atmospheric CO2?

That doesn't seem like an unreasonable thing to assert. But that is very different from what you wrote before. [Jane Q. Public] [slashdot.org]

Then maybe it isn't unreasonable to assert that all the "PSI" misinformation from Lord Monckton, Dr. Salby, Prof. Humlum, and John O'Sullivan is... misinformation. If you notice someone repeating those claims, please consider pointing out that they're ignoring simple accounting, decreasin

One thing that we all need to realize is that ALL of us have this same issue, not just the people who disagree with you.

The problem is that admitting it puts you at a significant disadvantage at debates. If you can no longer summon the (self-)righteous fury your opponent can, not only are you more likely to give in from sheer exhaustion, but people viewing the debate are likely to consider your opponent as dominant and confuse that as being right. This, in turn, can have unfortunate consequences if the topic is something actually important, rather than just a means to establishing pack hierarchy.

I don't know if it's possible to tame your inner alpha male to the point where you can let it handle poo-flinging contests with other monkeys while still keeping your human intelligence in control of what you believe in or do, but if it is we'd better learn how fast, because we're running out of time. Or perhaps the problem is precisely the idea that it needs to be "tamed", rather than recruited as a member of the internal team. Perhaps we should simply accept that humans tend to establish pecking order, and practice how to do so without slipping into abuse or idiocy.

Then again, that would require admitting that people who think mainly in terms of pack hierarchy and territory aren't necessarily any less intelligent than people who think mainly in terms of logic and science, they just interpret the same message through a different lens. And that might be an unbearable blow to quite a few egos.

That's not a scientific statement, it's a political one. Science doesn't vote, it either provably is or it isn't.

When we push beliefs on people and claim it's science, we shouldn't be surprised when they treat it as flexibly as they do any other belief. Nor should we be surprised when such misuse of science erodes their faith in its overall veracity.

Is climate change human caused? Hell if I know. But I know it's been push

The percentages come from looking at all studies, papers, research, etc. and determining the number one one side or the other. The "voting" is indirect through statistics, not scientist going to the polls, so to speak.

But I know it's been pushed on the public about as unscientifically as Eugenics and Phrenology.

Whoa! Phrenology has no scientific basis, but Eugenics certainly does. If you take all the people with traits you don't like, and murder them, you will have fewer of those traits in the next generation. That is a scientific fact. Just because you don't like the political act of mass murder, doesn't make it scientifically invalid.

If you take all the people with traits you don't like, and murder them, you will have fewer of those traits in the next generation. That is a scientific fact. Just because you don't like the political act of mass murder, doesn't make it scientifically invalid.

Do you have a case study that you can reference which substantiates this claim?

Do you have a case study that you can reference which substantiates this claim?

I'm not sure why you need a case study to support research that was originally done almost 150 years ago,but If you'll accept "not allowing the undesirables to breed" as a proxy for "murder them,"here's a more recent long term study: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domesticated_silver_fox [wikipedia.org]

Or you could just read about Mendel's original research with pea plants and honey bees.

Is this a case of belief vs. scientific fact? Technically we are are animals.
It doesn't matter if it's people, foxes or peas, for genetics the same principles apply to all living things that reproduce in the same fashion, as in two sexes that combine their genetic material into an offspring.
Agriculture has used selective breeding for plants and animals, that follows the very same principle, for ages with great success.

The big difference between us and 'lower animals' as well as plants is that we created

Phrenology has no scientific basis, but Eugenics certainly does. If you take all the people with traits you don't like, and murder them, you will have fewer of those traits in the next generation. That is a scientific fact.

That's basic animal husbandry. Eugenics takes it a step further - to a belief that weeding out the undesirables in a population will improve the species. But the last century of animal husbandry and now genetics suggests a different result - that from bulldogs to dairy cows the more thoroughly bred the animal, the more fragile it becomes. That a loss of genetic diversity leads to extinction.

Eugenics was presented as science -- look everybody, we can control attributes through breeding. Surely if we breed ou

Or we can analyse the fallacy involved in you trying, without any justification, to tie climatologists to eugenicists. It seems your Just as guilty of the behaviours laid out in the article ad, say, Creationists

It could work if it was done according to proper scientific management. The historic approaches tended to involve determining that the lowest social classes somehow happened to carry all the bad genes.

A more modern approach could be, for example, tracking down everyone who carries a Huntington's disease gene and offering them free sterilization, and the promise of access to PGD should they wish to breed in the future (Or, if you're on a budget, you could just kill them - either way works). Thus an undesirab

Whoa! Phrenology has no scientific basis, but Eugenics certainly does. If you take all the people with traits you don't like, and murder them, you will have fewer of those traits in the next generation.

While it is certainly true that selective breeding is a scientific fact, almost all historical eugenicist movements have NOT been based on scientifically verified traits. Take some time and read about the nonsense criteria that eugenics people would use -- measuring ear size or facial characteristics to determine "degenerate" people more likely to be stupid or commit crimes.

You seem to think that "eugenics" is just a synonym for "selective breeding" or something. While the proponents of eugenics often claim that, in fact their criteria for selection were generally based on bogus "science" (even phrenology) and generally tend to be motivated more by politics or class distinctions than science.

So, no, actual eugenics as practiced does NOT have a scientific basis, even if the general principle might theoretically work.

Parent poster didn't do his research, preferring to post what fit his ideological preconceptions instead.

I've actually read a number of treatises written by the founders of eugenics in the mid-1800s through its heyday in the early 1900s, including all of the literature on cultural "degeneration" etc. that led to targeting of Jews, Roma, poor people, stupid people, etc. on the basis of incredibly shaky science. Have you?

I suggest before going around suggesting that someone hasn't done research that you do your own. There are some hints at eugenics by a small number of people today (including people like Jam

I'm sorry but that is extremely wrong. Science isn't math: it doesn't prove. The best you can do as a scientist is gather data and construct a model which fits this data. You then attempt to predict things and confirm those predictions with more data. The longer the model holds up, the more likely it is to be "right", but it's always just a model and it always could be shown wrong tomorrow.

When a claim such as "97 percent of climate scientists believe human activities are causing global warming." is given, what it means is that 97% of climate scientists currently accept the model that humans are causing global warming. It means that, according to the data they have available and the models they have analyzed and/or constructed, the notion that humans drive global warming is prevalent in just about every model that accurately fits the data.

The only reason this whole thing is political (or a debate in the first place) is because there are people who stand to lose significantly from environmentally friendly measures and a move away from hydrocarbons.

Re: "And you and I are among them. The kind of massive economic shift needed to materially reduce the use of fossil fuels will seriously undermine your standard of living, as will the war with China necessary to stop them from burning coal." -- I disagree. The USA is currently in a better than usual position to start investing in its energy needs for the future.

We're rapidly approaching "peak oil" (some say we've already passed it) and so it's only going to get more expensive and environmentally damaging to extract and process in the immediate future. This means that while the US economy remains heavily dependent on oil and gas, it's going to get more and more expensive to run and eventually production and service costs will reach an unprofitable tipping point and the economy will likely crash. Expect to see more attempts to grab/control more countries' natural resources in an attempt to mitigate this... in other words, a lot more military conflict and political unheaval in the world (some also say that this is already happening).

At the other end of the spectrum, Germany has relatively few empirical interests around the world (they import most of their energy and until recently relied on nuclear power) and its economy is mostly based on exporting its engineering, design, and management expertise, so any savings they can make in energy sourcing will boost their economy quickly and substantially. They're leading the EU in investing in switching over to renewable energy sources, creating Europ-wide electric rail local, national, and international mass-transportation systems, developing more efficient, lower emissions housing and businesses, legislating and funding for its widespread deployment, and developing the expertise to do this for other countries too.

The US is getting left behind in this respect. If the US invests in switching over its energy production to modern, renewable sources and efficient more effective infrastructure, it'll not only have a more secure future in the geopolitical and global economic sense, but govt. funded infrastructure projects like this were partly what brought the US out of the great depression in the 1930s (FDR's new deal). The US infrastructure is in dire need of an overhaul right now and, because of the recession, it'd be relatively cheap to do it (Remember those optimistic Obama speeches and rhetoric about switching over bankrupt car manufacturing companies to infrastructure projects? What ever happened to that?).

Meanwhile, China, India, Brazil, etc. are also investing substantially in renewable energy sources and technologies and infrastructure. Nothern European countries make substantial savings in domestic and business energy consumption through higher efficiency, e.g. better insulation, more efficient heating and lighting systems, better re-use and recycling, which necessitates efficient and effective central planning. To a great extent, doing this in the US would mean accepting that they're no longer a nation of "pioneer settlers" in a land of infinite space and resources (the US changed from major exporter to major importer decades ago) and that they need to consolidate and collectivise their infrastructure. Good luck with that in the current US political and ideological climate though.

Actually, it is neither. It just is. As in "just is" a fact, readily observable and incontrovertible. Now, the suggestion that it is something else is, itself, a highly "political" statement clearly aimed at diminishing the weight of the fact that an overwhelming majority of those best equipped to assess the data have arrived at the same conclusion. No, the matter is not "settled". No scientist worthy of the title would even suggest as much, but the constantly repeated meme that we should thus do nothing until it is "settled" is simply insane.

You exaggerate here:
"readily observable and incontrovertible".
The study of abstracts of assorted scientific papers was done very subjectively.
Some authors said they were counted as on one side when they were aren't on any side. And so on.

That said, it's clearly a majority of climate science.

Climate science finds itself in the unusual position of making quantitative predictions of chaotic systems based on numerical digital simulations, which in turn are based on limited data. Compare that to, oh say

"That's not a scientific statement, it's a political one."
How else can you convince a layperson at all? Wikipedia tells me that Fermat's last theorem was proven after hundreds of years but when I look at the proof it is 150 pages long and inaccessible to me. If you tell me that 97 of 100 mathematicians who reviewed this proof stated it is correct I would happily agree that the problem has been solved. Essentially what it does is show you that the vast majority of individuals in the environmental sciences h

Yes, but climate change is scientific fact. The opposing view that you're referring to would be that Liberal republicans could believe in the fantasy that climate change does not exist... and while it's true there are such democrats out there, they are not relevant to this topic. I think that, if you wanted to include democrats in a similar light you'd have to ask them about nuclear power. They tend to completely disregard science when it comes to technologies they fear. Thought this is a generalization. Which is the funny thing about this story. They seem to be reporting "Generalizations about an entire group of people are not 100% accurate!" Well, duh...

Gravity isn't a scientific fact, exaggerating your position doesn't make it stronger.

Yes it is. The argument you're making is silly, and old.It's called href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_ignorance">Ad ignorantiam

Using that argument I could disprove every "Fact" that's ever occurred. Are we all living in the matrix? Is this all the dream of a sleeping baby floating on a cloud? Yes, anything is possible, there are no "facts."

But baring the dreams of floating sleeping babies, gravity is a FACT. Just like climate change. In science we deal with probobilities, and the probobil

Nuclear power is an imperfect example as well, because the argument there isn't about the science - no one is disputing that nuclear reactions exist, and that electricity can be generated. The argument is more about whether humans can build and manage nuclear power plants with the near perfection that is required.

Oh, ye of little faith. There are absolutely people who believe that nuclear reactions doesn't not work.http://www.big-lies.org/NUKE-L... [big-lies.org] There are nutters everywere.

What is its opposite to which you refer? If you are looking for an example of people disbelieving science when it conflicts with their own religious or political views, what is the scientific doctrine that Democrats typically reject?

I don't think that those examples are anywhere near as apt as the global warming one. For one, these do not have such overwhelming scientific backing. Secondly, they are not as often quoted by the politicians.

Finally, they are overly-specific claims. The "more guns, less crime" claim misleads the gun control aims in that they are attempting to reduce the gun-related murders. Nobody claims that scepticism is a bad thing, but denialism dressed up as scepticism is. And all economies can fail, but few politicia

That assumes that the politicians have stated that this problem can be solved with one action (in this case the signing of an agreement). It may be that they know that an international agreement must occur as a first step in a long process that requires the various countries keep a dialogue going.

The problem is that it is almost impossible to prove that nobody thinks that signing an agreement is all that needs to be done, because to do so I would have to provide statements from every single one of those people.

However, you can disprove me in an instant by showing a single statement where someone makes such a daft claim. The one link [telegraph.co.uk] that you did provide did not show this, as it discussed the further actions that were required beyond just making an agreement. It really is a demonstration of my claim.

Two of those aren't scientific doctrines, and there isn't an overwhelming agreement from their respective communities on which side is the correct one. Skepticism on global warming science is just some more bullshit that Republicans feed you, frankly. Armchair scientists are a plague, not healthy.

We're not talking about my belief system, we're talking about "scientific doctrine", or as I interpret it, scientific populism.

Then why are you going on about "brain capacity or structure" when we are discussing what is and is not human?

Clearly you want it to be about your belief system rather than what is and is not a human scientifically. You would be very hard pressed to find a biologist tell you that a human beings fetus is not human. Results would be different when talking about an embryo, but I suspect that just the mere distinction between fetus and embryo has already injected too much science into the discussion for you

The GMO example is probably the best one so far. It is a claim that does go against most of the science, and I imagine is more likely to be a partisan argument. I doubt that even a large minority of Democrats would ever state this though, so in that respect it is not the perfect example.

I still think that the Republican/GW example is the best one, easily beating the Democrat/GMO and Republican/evolution choices. The implication that there is some agenda in selecting it is unwarranted.

for instance, by making clear that you can believe in human-induced climate change and still be a conservative Republican

How about making it clear that people have a wide variety of views on things like GWT, and its not simply true believers vs deniers. How about making it clear that not all Democrats believe in gun control.

Do you think scientists are all exactly in line on the rate of GW, the extent to which it is exacerbated by human activities, which of those activities are most impacting, to what extent we can improve the situation, and the expected impacts in the future?

Do you think scientists are all exactly in line on the rate of GW, the extent to which it is exacerbated by human activities, which of those activities are most impacting, to what extent we can improve the situation, and the expected impacts in the future?

No. But that's not the claim that's being made. The claim is that 97% of climate scientists agree (based on their research and the data underpinning that research) that AGW (climate change due to human impact) exists. Questions about severity, impact and potential mitigation/solutions are not included in that claim. Understand now?

The republicans are much better at drawing people together based on commonalities in what they hate and fear than the Democrats. That has worked best by pushing simple yes/no good/bad simplified versions of issues - like gun control - and burying the complications.

The republicans are much better at drawing people together based on commonalities in what they hate and fear than the Democrats. That has worked best by pushing simple yes/no good/bad simplified versions of issues - like gun control - and burying the complications.

Better? How about the "war on women" for example? Nobody has a monopoly on expertise in using those tactics.

I'm nothing resembling -ist. I simply live outside any religious belief. I could say that at the same time accept all of them and don't particularly care about any, apart from a knowledge perspective. I like knowing about them (think "20 questions") but that's it.

Doomsought wrote: "Are you Atheist? If so, you still have a religious belief."

This a a tired and specious argument. Not believing in something for which there is no evidence is not a religion.

But, let's put your hypothesis to a test. Do you believe in Santa Claus? No? Ok, you are an asanta-clausist and practice the religion of asanta-clausism. Do you believe in leprechauns? No? OK, you are an aleprechaunsist practicing the religion of aleprechaunsism. Do you believe the souls of the dead hang around and haunt houses? No? You're nothing but a aghostist worshiping at the alter of aghostism. Get it? Atheists simply don't believe in god the same way you don't believe in Santa Claus. That doesn't make it a religion.

Oh and you obviously don't understand science either. The scientific method does not rely on on the "assumption of fallibility". Where the hell did you get that from? Maybe you mean falsifiability? Falsifiability is a very different concept and is key to the scientific method. Humans are fallible. Scientists know this which why experiments must be repeatable and statistical analysis of data is required. But the scientific method doesn't "rely" on the "assumption of fallibility" in any way.

" for instance, by making clear that you can believe in human-induced climate change and still be a conservative Republican."

But you can't. The Republicans won't have you.

Ignorance is a choice, just like belief. The real problem is to get people to reject ignorance. The difficulty in that is that ignorance, like belief, is easy. Rejecting ignorance requires effort. That is why there are so many people who choose ignorance and belief over reason and fact.

For many, being identified as a member of a specific group, even if that group wants you to believe stupid things, is more important than objective reality. They must get something from that group membership that outweighs what they would get from reality. Reality CAN be a bitch.

Ignorance is a choice, just like belief. The real problem is to get people to reject ignorance. The difficulty in that is that ignorance, like belief, is easy. Rejecting ignorance requires effort. That is why there are so many people who choose ignorance and belief over reason and fact.

Interesting belief you have there.

I believe that belief is inherent to the human mind, necessary for operation in the world. I see belief in two general categories: rigid and fluid. When rigid, a belief is maintained even in

Increased scientific literacy increases sceptism toward those who claim to be the standard bearers of truth. "The more I learn the more I learn how little I know." Some old smart dude said something like this once.

Being religious and "accepting science" is just drawing the boundaries in a different place. There is still a science no-go zone so they really do not accept science they just define the boundaries differently.

How about on all beliefs should be rejected and replaced with reality. A belief system that contradicts with the world we live in should be diagnosed as a phsycological disorder.

Psychosis is a loss of contact with reality that usually includes: False beliefs about what is taking place or who one is (delusions) ; Seeing or hearing things that aren't there (hallucinations).

for instance, by making clear that you can believe in human-induced climate change and still be a conservative Republican."

When it comes to politicians, the question is not what they believe, but what they say they believe. Politicians are not as dumb as they pretend to be, and would stop pretending the day we start treating continuous incompetence the same as malice.

For example, there already are lots of Republican politicians who believe in global warming -- they just know better than to admit it. It would weaken their position, both during elections and during negotiations (since they intend to vote against any spending on curbing CO2). For what benefit? Honesty? They gave that up when they decided to win elections.

Climate science recognised El Nino/La Nina before the current bunch of "fundamentalists" got popular by blaming the 1906 San Francisco earthquake on Gods will instead of geology. The latest batch of science denialism is just the latest recruiting drive for that bunch of merchants in the temple - all you have to do is deny reality and fill the collection box with cash and a dumbed down cardboard God of an unchanging world will make it all better.

I'll believe in CAGW when the scientists quit fudging the numbers and it still shows it...

They aren't "fudging" numbers. This is climate data, it's HARD to deal with. You're talking about millions, even billions of measurements over periods of centuries. There are more moving parts to this data than you can possible conceive of. And companies that make profits off of fossil fuels have armies of people scouring their data for the tiniest errors. Surprise surprise they find some on occasion.

when they can explain historical data that contradicts the theory...

It doesn't. It's dead on.

and when they can explain why the warming has stopped for the last couple of decades.

It hasn't, at all.You are confusing local and short term temperature variations with a global, long term problem. People working for... well... whomever doesn't want you to believe in climate change, pick and chose data from a specific time, or location, or both... and show a cooling period in that specific area or at a specific time and then claim "Global warming is reverse! It's all lies" but this isn't about that specific area or time. This is about then GLOBAL AVERAGE temperature of the entire planet. That is, without a doubt, increasing. It's very slow, but it's like compound interest. It just keeps growing and growing, melting ice, heating bogs, and compounding the issue further. Temperatures in North Dakota falling for the past 10yrs is not relevant. The climate is a very, very, complicated machine.

As it is, he fudging is so blatant that "climate science" is nothing of the sort...it's a Trojan horse for the same lod tired leftist government takeoff of economies. That trick never works.

Plenty of scientists are republicans or even further right. Yet, less than 10 (that's ten0 out of hundreds of thousands, disagree with the simple finding that humans are altering the average global temperature of the planet. A global conspiracy to make your gas more expensive could never have that kind of influence. This is a consensus of unquestionable proportions. Either all the wind turbine makers and solar panel manufacturers have a hell of a lot more money than we thought and are using it to bribe the scientific community on a scale unprecedented in human history, or we really do have a problem.

I think that if there's one thing everyone could agree on, dumping crap into our atmosphere is a bad thing. We can fix it, and become a world leader in cheap power or we can sit back and hope all our scientists are lying to us. I, personally, am going with the former. And no, I'm not a democrat or a leftist.

I've noticed that every time somewhere in the US or Europe experiences a bit of cold weather for the season, comments sections all around the internet are filled with people proclaiming this proves climate change is a fraud.

...companies that make profits off of fossil fuels have armies of people scouring their data

I hear all sorts of stories but never see these sorts of accusations verified. Do you have evidence of armies?

It reminds me of the study that showed the Koches et cetera were spending billions on blogs and propaganda. Sounds reasonable. Until I realized there would have to be some newly rich people on the receiving end of all this dough. I haven't seen them. Got data?

They aren't "fudging" numbers. This is climate data, it's HARD to deal with. You're talking about millions, even billions of measurements over periods of centuries. There are more moving parts to this data than you can possible conceive of.

Indeed, and this is a problem when science tangles up with politics. Here we ware saying it's hard to deal with and requires quite a lot of corrections and processing, while the left of politics runs a coercive campaign that you should be called a pariah if you are not convinced by our data and therefore their policies. In science, our credibility is dragged under far more by agreeing politicians trying to co-opt us than by political opponents disagreeing with us. (Disagreement is part of the process; but b

I'll believe in CAGW when the scientists quit fudging the numbers and it still shows it

Are you seriously saying that every single scientific study that matches the Global Warming theory has had their numbers fudged? How do you know? If you are given any random article from a journal, can you point to the data that has been altered to fit the theory?

If not, the perhaps the alleged fudging isn't as blatant - or as widespread - as you suggest. It could be that it is only obvious that the data is bunk if you come at it from the assumption that all the global warming theories are false; in which c

Ah yes, the old "they made a new name, therefore it must be wrong" argument (as if that makes any difference). I wonder why the same people who complain about this don't also come out to question why the denialists now claim that the warming has stopped since 1998 when they used to say that the climate had been cooling since that date. That change of wording seems to have gone unnoticed, and yet it is very telling that the original statement was incorrect and that the climate is still getting warmer.

religious zealots are the ones who see most clearly that science functions as a religion in modern society

In the sense that science and religion both underpin the way people see and interact with the universe, other people, and many of their attempts to control both. Sort of how apples function as oranges if what you are doing is holding a piece of fruit or chucking it at someone's head. Eating them are somewhat different experiences though.

You must be an American if you equate liberal with socialist. In Europe, they tend to be the very opposite of each other.

Yep. The European Liberals [wikipedia.org] actually stand for liberty. The American users of the name are the opposite — their first solution to any problem is to create a government agency responsible for solving it, as well as simply banning the use of anything potentially dangerous — and thus the proper name for them is Illiberal.

You're right: Liberalism in Europe [wikipedia.org]
"In general, liberalism in Europe is a political movement that supports a broad tradition of individual liberties and constitutionally-limited and democratically accountable government. This usually encompasses the belief that government should act to alleviate poverty and other social problems, but not through radical changes to the structure of society."

A "liberal" in Europe wants smaller govt like conservatives do in America, while liberals in America want a bigger govt that has more control and attempts to eliminate poverty by equalizing income like a socialist would, like doubling minimum wage to the same wage most college graduates receive.

Most of the AGW activists are pursuing political agendas that have a limited connection to AGW. Here are some questions to ask yourself - Why are AGW activists not actively pursuing increased hydroelectric power? Why are AGW activists not actively pursuing increased nuclear power?

Mostly because they're not interested in mandating specific aproaches. Instead of the old-fashioned approach of Nixon's EPA, they're going for market-based solutions: putting a price on carbon emissions, for instance. Or a conservative variant on that, George H. W. Bush's cap-and-trade mechanism updated by John McCain for carbon dioxide.

Or the most recent study's proposal: just eliminating taxpayer subsidies for fossil fuels would get us halfway to the 2-degree target.

Whoever it was who said it was an idiot who does/did not understand the difference between science and religion.

And science HAS fulfilled many of its promises of health and life (vaccines, for example) and continues to do so every day with new research.

"... we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations"because those are the only explanations of real-world phenomena that don't require the act of a su